Tea Party on Jobs

Wisconsin: counter-protest to abolish collective bargaining

The Saturday after the assembly passed the bill, abolishing collective bargaining for state employees, we saw the largest crowds yet gather at the capitol--an estimated 70,000 people. Those calling in "sick" from work during the week
had been joined by others who had a legitimate day off on Saturday.

Tea Party groups organized a counterprotest that day.
I was grateful for their support, but having seen how some of the union protestors accosted Republican legislators and officials, I worried how they might respond to a sizable contingent of conservatives.
I spent much of that day praying for the safety of folks on both sides, and asking my staff for regular updates. Thankfully, while there was some yelling back and forth, nothing happened.

Real unemployment is 18%, counting under-employment

In the President's speech tonight, we heard more well-scripted rhetoric. Now let me tell you what we did not hear. We did not hear the real facts about the state of the union. Facts don't lie. Here are some of the facts you did not hear:

Unemployment:
The December unemployment rate was reported to be 8.5%. But if you add in the people who have been looking for so long that they have stopped looking and they are discouraged, and you add in the 8 million people that are underemployed, the real rate
of unemployment is 18%. It's a matter of how you want to count it.

Economic growth: Our economic growth in the last 3 years has been anemic. In 2011 alone, it was less than 2%.
If we were really in a recovery, our GDP growth should be around 5% per annum. And that's still only half of what countries like China are experiencing in terms of their economic growth.